It seemed appropriate that on a signpost on the road running along one side of the Bercy Arena, they had the name Esplanade Johnny Hallyday, one of France’s most famous pop singers. Inside one of the Olympic Games’ biggest rock’n’roll acts Simone Biles was, despite a minor injury picked up in the previous round, due on stage to compete with the USA in the Artistic Gymnastics team event.
The least surprising thing from just after halfway through the four-routine event was that the USA would win the gold medal, while the 27-year-old Biles had won already the audience.
It was Biles’s Redemption Tour and she needed no introduction to the crowd, her story a movie looking for a script. Too late with The Simone Biles Story: Courage so Far, it has already been done.
When novelist Scott Fitzgerald said there are no second acts in American lives, he got it all wrong with Biles and from the moment she appeared in the vast arena in her spangling red, white and blue uniform, a powder keg of energy and charisma, 15,000 fans began an evening of veneration of everything Biles and her team-mates Sunisa Lee, Jordan Chiles, Jade Carey and Hezly Rivera did.
The moment seemed to be saying that this was Biles in her second act again chasing an Olympic gold medal.
Her story is dog-eared by now, but it runs from a fostered child to becoming one of the greatest gymnasts in history, before mental health concerns forced her to withdraw from most of her events at Tokyo 2020.
She pulled out during the team final after experiencing a pre-competition bout of the “twisties”, a mildly terrifying term gymnasts use for a loss of spatial awareness when they are tumbling through the air.
There was also the despicable Larry Nassar, now serving 40 to 125 years in a US federal prison, for abusing young American gymnasts, and again part of the distressful side of the Biles story was cast as a living drama, one of glamour, transcendent talent and also pain.
The final was vastly more than winning of more time for Biles, the most decorated artistic gymnast in history, with 38 Olympic and world medals. It was a statement of being better, of pulling through and showing the world one more time.
From the first discipline of the evening, the vault, to the uneven bars, balance beam and floor, Biles was championed from the steeply rising seating in the hall, the last routine on the floor rightfully allowing her the final few frames of glory on the night as the USA steamrollered the rest of the world.
And Biles didn’t blow her lines. With the 1,000-watt smile and painted nails, she brought the easily led crowd to its feet. Afterwards, athletes from other countries funnelled over to the mat to hug and embrace her, her score of 14.66 shooting the USA to a winning 171.296, more than five points better than second-placed Italy and third-placed Brazil, who just edged out Britain for the bronze medal.
From her first vault, the night felt like a coronation, the US instantly taking the lead with 44.100 points. On the uneven bars Biles didn’t do her signature Yurchenko double pike, opting for a less difficult Cheng vault and scored a 14.9 for her effort.
On the dismount there was a small step forward, a wall of noise, a high five from her coach Laurent Landi and enthusiastic clapping from US film-maker Spike Lee in the audience.
As part of the four-discipline rotation, the teams moved in mass, the US and Biles from the vault to the balance beam. There was a wobble as she momentarily lost her balance on a wolf turn, a squatting move on the beam where she spins on one foot and again on landing from a somersault.
But the night was not made for Biles to fall off the beam, her score of 14.366 one of the best of the eight teams.
By then the hurlers on the ditch were saying the USA had it won before the floor exercises had even started, the four-point lead on second-placed Italy, not even a face plant on the mat from any of the American stars could fatally dent their lead.
Biles knew her team had won the gold medal before she closed with a soaring signature floor routine, giving the fans the fairytale ending they craved. On the US team benches, her team-mates and coaches stood, formed a huddle and celebrated. Then, with a flashing smile and twirl, the 4ft 8in giant of the Olympic Games stepped off the mat.
